Consultation on primary price terms and conditions - pricing approaches1 Aug 2014
On 1 August 2014, the ACCC commenced consultation on the pricing approaches to determine the primary price terms and conditions for the mobile terminating access service (MTAS) final access determination.
Discussion paper on pricing approaches
On 1 August 2014, The ACCC released a discussion paper on the pricing approaches for the MTAS. Submissions to the discussion paper closed on 29 August 2014
ACCC position on pricing approaches
After considering the submissions to the discussion paper, the ACCC has reached the view that:
- the most appropriate way to set prices for mobile voice termination services is to use a long run incremental costs methodology (either a TSLRIC+ or pure LRIC methodology), which the ACCC intends to implement using international benchmarking
- the most appropriate way to set SMS termination prices is to use a conversion factor - to set SMS termination price as a fraction of the mobile voice termination price based on the network capacity used by both services.
The ACCC considers that these methodologies will allow the ACCC to quickly determine prices for the MTAS services which are based on the efficient costs of providing the services. The ACCC also considers that these approaches are consistent with the legislative requirements under the Competition and Consumer Act 2010.
The ACCC is currently seeking external assistance in implementing these pricing approaches.